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Home / Sports / Raheem Sterling strikes twice as Manchester City go top with Southampton rout

Raheem Sterling strikes twice as Manchester City go top with Southampton rout

Posted on Wednesday, November 07, 2018 by Rhonda Young

Gary Neville has suggested Manchester City have become very adept in their gamesmanship- a notion Pep Guardiola does not agree

City's opening group game defeat at home to Lyon came in front thousands of empty seats and manager Pep Guardiola has previously argued that the club are not ready to win the Champions League because the fans are not excited by that challenge. City are now top of their group but a loss or a draw could see them relinquish that position. John Stones is likely to be given a breather though, with Vincent Kompany expected to partner up Aymeric Laporte in the heart of the defence.

Pep might surprise a few by selecting Danilo at right-back.

Despite the emphatic nature of City's victory, Guardiola admitted his side's defending can improve after Southampton squandered chances to narrow the deficit. Kyle Walker and Benjamin Mendy should continue as the full-backs. They create two versus ones in good areas. Viktor Kovalenko, who scored the victor against Dynamo Kyiv at the weekend, is likely to be rewarded with a start on Wednesday in the No.10 role.

He further added that the Saints had been given too many opportunities to score: "When they were close to our box, [we had] the feeling they can score goals".

Watford have been decent, but they were just beaten at Newcastle, and simply have to be dispatched at St Mary's for the sake of points, confidence and ending the long wait for a home win.

Ilkay Gundogan and Nicolas Otamendi are included in Manchester City's squad for Wednesday's Champions League game at home to Shakhtar Donetsk after recovering from their injuries.

The game against Shakhtar comes four days before a huge derby with rivals Manchester United, but Walker insists City are only focusing on Shakhtar.

Manchester City have kept eight clean sheets in their previous ten matches across all competitions.

City restored their three-goal advantage before the interval, however, thanks to Sterling's simple finish past McCarthy after Aguero kept the ball in play and squared it to his teammate, though the Englishman required a couple of bites of the cherry after miscuing his initial shot.

Jesus was given the nod for the reverse fixture against Shakhtar, but failed to make a mark on the night.

Ings stepped up and rolled the ball to Ederson's left - the first penalty that the Brazilian has conceded in the English top flight, having saved the last two, ending his hopes of keeping a club-record seventh clean sheet in a row.

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